Easiest way to parse a comma delimited string to some kind of object I can loop through to access the individual values?

Question

What is the easiest way to parse a comma delimited string list of values into some kind of object that I can loop through, so that I can access the individual values easily?

Answer 1

Sometimes the columns will have commas within themselves, such as:

"Some item", "Another Item", "Also, One more item"

In these cases, splitting on "," will break some columns. Maybe an easier way, but I just made my own method (as a bonus, handles spaces after commas and returns an IList):

private IList GetColumns(string columns)
{
    IList list = new List();

    if (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(columns))
    {
        if (columns[0] != '\"')
        {
            // treat as just one item
            list.Add(columns);
        }
        else
        {
            bool gettingItemName = true;
            bool justChanged = false;
            string itemName = string.Empty;

            for (int index = 1; index < columns.Length; index++)
            {
                justChanged = false;
                if (subIndustries[index] == '\"')
                {
                    gettingItemName = !gettingItemName;
                    justChanged = true;
                }

                if ((gettingItemName == false) &&
                (justChanged == true))
                {
                    list.Add(itemName);
                    itemName = string.Empty;
                    justChanged = false;
                }

                if ((gettingItemName == true) && (justChanged == false))
                {
                    itemName += columns[index];
                }
            }
        }
    }

    return list;
}